The education inspectorate said that most schools visited were beginning to understand the potential of the 'remodelling the school workforce' agenda (restructuring of the workforce to allow a greater focus on improving quality of teaching and learning), and that most were making actual progress in this regard.
Source: Remodelling the School Workforce, HMI 2596, Office for Standards in Education (07002 637833)
Links: Report
Date: 2005-Dec
A new book said that teachers were being presented with an impossible task: they were expected to educate young people as the future of society, within organizational structures that were outdated and frustrating.
Source: Sandra Leaton Gray, Teachers Under Siege, Trentham Books (01782 745567)
Links: Summary
Date: 2005-Oct
A new book said that many children faced significant barriers to learning at school, often requiring one-to-one support beyond the capacity of their teacher. It examined how support staff in schools, such as Connexions personal advisors and learning mentors, could help these pupils make the most of their education.
Source: Vanessa Cooper, Support Staff in Schools, National Children s Bureau (020 7843 6029)
Links: Summary | Children Now report
Date: 2005-Oct
A think-tank report said that overwork and poor pupil behaviour, not wages, were the most common barriers to teachers working in 'challenging' schools.
Source: Anna Bush, Choice and Equity in Teacher Supply, Institute for Public Policy Research, available from Central Books (0845 458 9911)
Links: IPPR press release
Date: 2005-Sep
A survey found that more than 20 per cent of schools that advertised for a new head in the previous year failed to make an appointment.
Source: John Howson, The State of the Labour Market for Senior Staff in Schools in England and Wales: 2004-2005, Secondary Heads Association (0116 299 1122) and National Association of Head Teachers
Links: Report (pdf) | SHA press release
Date: 2005-Sep
A paper considered the operation of the new system of performance-related pay for teachers in England since 2000. Teachers appeared not to be greatly motivated by the financial incentive element of the system: but there was tentative evidence that improvements in goal-setting within schools were positively related to rising pupil academic performance.
Source: Richard Belfield and David Marsden, Performance Pay for Teachers: Linking individual and organisational level targets, DP703, Centre for Economic Performance/London School of Economics (020 7955 7673)
Links: Paper (pdf) | Abstract
Date: 2005-Aug
A study sought to establish how a climate could be created to ensure that enough high-quality teachers wanted to teach, and stay teaching, in the most challenging schools.
Source: Anna Bush, Laura Edwards, Francesca Hopwood Road and Miranda Lewis, Why Here? Report of qualitative work with teachers working in schools above and below the floor targets, Research Report 666, Department for Education and Skills (0845 602 2260)
Links: Report (pdf) | Brief (pdf)
Date: 2005-Jul
A new book used case studies to illustrate the day-to-day experience of learning mentors, and how they improved children's learning, participation, personal development and well-being.
Source: Leora Cruddas, Learning Mentors in Schools: policy and practice, Trentham Books (01782 745567)
Links: Summary
Date: 2005-Jun
The School Teachers' Review Body said that management allowances, which rewarded teachers for taking leadership roles in schools, should be replaced with new teaching and learning responsibility payments.
Source: Fourteenth Report 2005, Cm 6430, School Teachers' Review Body, TSO (0870 600 5522) | House of Commons Hansard, Written Ministerial Statement 22 February 2005, columns 29-36WS, TSO
Links: Report (pdf links) | Hansard | DfES press release | EOLG press release | Guardian report
Date: 2005-Feb
